Tourism and biosecurity: a content analysis of Aotearoa New Zealand news media reporting 2009–2019

ABSTRACT

There is growing interest in the use and utility of news media content analysis in tourism research. We report a content analysis of 153 news media articles on a topic of growing interest among tourism researchers globally: tourism and biosecurity. Our work is based on media reports from Aotearoa New Zealand news sources over the period 2009–2019, identifying five key themes. Together they illustrate how tourism, nature conservation, agriculture, horticulture and forestry are utterly and irretrievably interconnected in global flows of people and organisms. They also highlight the important role played by the many actors at policy and operational levels in tourism and border control that have a role to play in minimising potential impacts of biosecurity breaches. We conclude by discussing the value of media content analyses in tourism research stressing that the method, on its own, will reveal only part of the story, and should always be followed up with more intense and critical interrogation of the issues under study.

KEYWORDS:

• Tourism
• biosecurity
• animal and plant pests
• media content analysis
• New Zealand

Acknowledgements

The authors also thank the members of the Council for Australasian Tourism and Hospitality Education (CAUTHE) for providing a conference venue for discussing and honing the foundational ideas to this case study.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The authors' wish to acknowledge funding provided by AgResearch as part of the Better Border Biosecurity (B3) collaboration.

Notes on contributors

Michael Mackay

Michael Mackay leads the Innovation Centre of Excellence: Consumer Interface, at Aotearoa New Zealand’s Crown Research Institute, AgResearch. His research interests include agri-tourism, social impact assessment, regional regeneration, and rural entrepreneurship.

Roxanne Henwood

Roxanne Henwood is a Research Associate at Aotearoa, New Zealand’s Crown Research Institute, AgResearch, where she is in the Consumer Food Systems team. Roxanne supports a variety of interdisciplinary projects that are broadly concerned with sustainable transitions in the agri-food sector in Aotearoa, New Zealand.

Tracy Nelson

Tracy Nelson is Science Objective Leader – Sustainable Agri-Food Production Systems at Aotearoa, New Zealand’s Crown Research Institute, AgResearch, where she is also a Senior Social Scientist, specialising in qualitative research.

Harvey C. Perkins

Harvey Perkins is Emeritus Professor of Planning at the University of Auckland. A past-President of the New Zealand Geographical Society, his research interests encompass elements of urban and rural change, including those associated with tourism. He is one of the authors of The New Biological Economy: How New Zealanders are Creating Value from the Land published by Auckland University Press in 2018.

Jude Wilson

Jude Wilson is an independent researcher specialising in both qualitative and mixed methods research. She has a background in tourism research, including tourist behaviour and destination management.